PETALING JAYA: From a fitness coach to the main man, the life of Martin Stano has changed drastically.
But the Slovakian Stano showed the switch was justified when the head coach led his team to a one-goal advantage in the two-legged Malaysia Cup quarter-finals after beating Kuching City 1-0 in the first-leg at the State Stadium in Kuching on Sunday.
In the game billed as the Borneo derby, winger Farhan Roslan emerged as the hero when he finished off a brilliant setpiece play in the 32nd minute.
Derby games can be feisty, but Stano was calm and ensured his charges kept a clean sheet and will head into the second leg at the Likas Stadium in Kota Kinabalu on Dec 23 with more confidence.
Over the past years, Stano was known as the man who executed tough drills during training sessions to ensure his charges stayed in top fitness condition.
But he has found that being a head coach is a whole different story, as he had to manage line-ups, substitutions, and coordinate with his coaching staff.
All is good so far for Stano.
“It is a very difficult derby match in terms of tactics, physicality, and also emotions, even though we won here last week in the Super League,” said Stano.
“This Malaysia Cup match is different because it consists of two legs, and even though we won, we still have the second leg where anything can happen in football, and we cannot lose focus,” said Stano.
He also used to work with the national team when Tan Cheng Hoe was coach.
“I am proud of the commitment of every player, especially the national players who have faced tough matches with the country and are now helping the club and will return to the Harimau Malaya squad after this.
“Kuching City are a team with good tactics, and our target here is to score goals and return to Likas for the second match with some necessary changes due to yellow cards and some players who are injured.”
Sabah will see the likes of centreback Dominic Tan, wingback Daniel Ting, midfielder Stuart Wilkin and striker Darren Lok return to the national setup, as they prepare for the final AFF Cup Group A match against Singapore at the National Stadium in Bukit Jalil on Friday.
Meanwhile, Kuching coach Aidil Sharin still believes his team have a chance to get to the semi-finals of the competition but lamented that his side are supposed to do better with their setpiece defending.
“Setpiece is a problem and we conceded via that play, which is something that we have to work on. But the way we played the overall game, I was satisfied and there is belief we can do something in Kota Kinabalu,” said the Singaporean.
